I know exactly what to do with my evil Juju wedding ring after my split

"Sell it, leave it to the kids, melt it down... I have options but there is one thing I need to do before passing on any bad spirits," writes Carli for Kidspot.

When you’ve been separated for some time from your ex, the question invariably comes up from friends: what are you going to do with your wedding ring?

It’s not something I had really given a whole lot of thought to. Until I got a skip bin to clear out his uncollected junk cluttering up my shed.

I took great delight in smashing said junk into the bin. (I first gave away a lot in the buy nothing group.)

It was better than any therapy session I’ve been to in the past year (apologies to my psych) and definitely helped clear some pent-up rage I didn’t even know I had left.

Want to join the family? Sign up to our Kidspot newsletter for more stories like this.

RELATED: My husband’s ex wants me to be her childcare

"Out of sight, out of mind"

That triggered me furiously searching the house high and low for any last scrap of him I could throw away.

It was then I found the ring box I had stashed out of sight, out of mind in a drawer. Ruthless me wanted to toss it too but another side of me, the one that actually hates wastage of any kind, won out.

I felt like I hadn’t thought about all the options available yet. So I did what any 30-odd-year-old would do and turned to the internet for answers.

Give it back. Toss it into the ocean. Melt it. Donate it. Leave it in the will to the kids and let them decide. Barter with my cleaner for future cleans. The last one is my very favourite, and If I had a cleaner I might try float this idea by them. Alas, I do not.

Still not super thrilled with these answers for myself, I put it to my divorced friends.

“I kept it for my kids, one of them may like it when they are older. I know my ex threw his in the bin,” one said.

“I left (the country town she was in) with my two-door Barina piled high with possessions and the kids. I ditched it out the window with a massive smile on my face,” confessed another.

In all honesty, I only have two divorced friends, so that was the end of my friend research. The only other person I could think to ask was my mum, who divorced my father nearly 20 years ago.

Image: Carli at her wedding, and the ring she no longer needs.

RELATED: My daughter’s surname is my ex’s and it’s triggering

"Bad Juju"

Me: Mum I’m doing some research about weddings rings, what did you do with the one from my father?

Mum: Sorry I’m not much help, it got stolen in that break in.

Me: Problem solved then.

Mum: Yep...Two minutes later: Mum: Suggestion - melt it down and turn it into something else.

Me: Hmm, feels like bad Juju?

Mum: Nah, bad Juju is selling it or giving it to someone when the marriage didn’t work out, it might be passed on.

I mean that opens a whole other can of worms, right? Do I want to keep part of a ring that was meant to be forever?

Will I just stare at the new necklace/ring and be reminded of him all the time?

This still didn’t seem right for me, so I put it to a group chat. Not sure why I didn’t think of this first.

Their suggestions: We could get some smudge sticks and sage and cleanse it. Or sell it, and then pay for a year of therapy with the profits. Give it to a homeless woman. Put it in a jar in a smash room and then go to town.

And that is exactly why friends are the family we choose.

I think I’m going to do all these things, just not quite in that order. I’m going to have a little party and cleanse the rings, get that evil Juju out. I’ll sell the rings, donate some to charity and with the rest pay for some therapy sessions and a smash room session as a final hoorah.

Problem solved.

Originally published as I know exactly what to do with my evil Juju wedding ring after my split